Daily Devotionals

Mornings and Evenings with Jesus

Devotional: May 7th

He that is spiritual. - 1 Corinthians 2:15.

THE spiritual man is opposed to the natural man. A natural man means a man in his unregenerate state, under the power and influence of those principles and affections which are natural; a spiritual man is one who is renewed by the Spirit of God, the Author and Source of all real goodness and holiness. Hence we read of being “born of the Spirit,” of “living in the Spirit,” of “walking in the Spirit,” of “being led by the Spirit,” of “praying in the Spirit,” of being “filled with the Spirit,” of being “strengthened by the Spirit,” and “bringing forth the fruits of the Spirit.” No wonder, therefore, they are called spiritual. From the Spirit of God they derive a character, and become themselves what they naturally were not. They have spiritual appetites; they “hunger and thirst after righteousness.”

Hence they hope and fear and mourn and rejoice accordingly. They have spiritual senses, as the apostle says, which are “exercised to discern good and evil.” They have spiritual eyes; they’ can see the Saviour-King on his throne, and the land that is very far off: they have spiritual ears; they know his voice: they have spiritual lips; they show forth his praise: they have spiritual taste; and therefore they can savour the things which be of God. But let us more particularly examine ourselves by the tests which are laid down in the Scriptures whereby we may ascertain whether we are of the number of “the spiritual.”

We may judge of our character by our thoughts. The thoughts are the first-born of the mind, and always resemble it: a spiritual man’s thoughts cling and cluster round the cross as bees do around the hive, and for the same reason,-for there is the honey. “How precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!” Not that all his thoughts are good; yet he can say, with David, “I hate vain thoughts.”

Then there are the desires: “there be many who say, “Who will show me any good?” These seek happiness in the pleasures of sin, or in the things of time and sense only; but the spiritual man is saying, “Lord, lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon me;” “Oh, visit me with thy salvation, that I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation; that I may glory with thy inheritance,” and with Paul, “that I may win Christ, and be found in him;” or with the church they are saying, “Our desire is to thee, and to the remembrance of thy name.”

Another test is gratitude. While a spiritual man overlooks none of God’s mercies, he blesses him for his daily bread, but much more for the bread which cometh down from heaven,-for corporeal favours, but much more for spiritual blessings. He sings, with Watts,-

“To thee we owe our wealth and friends,

And health, and safe abode:

Thanks to thy name for meaner things,

But they are not my God.”

We may take another test from the use of creature possessions. The Christian regards all these as the purchase of his Saviour’s blood. He finds a sacredness in them which the natural man knows not of, and enjoys them with a sense of special favour. And

“How sweet our daily mercies prove

When they are season’d by his love!”

Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me; when his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; as I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle; when the Almighty was yet with me. - Job 29:2-5.

THE remembrance of our early views and feelings may tend to check present felt or feared declension, and become a principle of recall and revival, inducing us to say, “I will go and return to my first husband, for then it was better with me than now.” We read of the “first ways of David.” Alas! how often are the first ways of Christians better than their last ways. Still what was said to the church at Ephesus will apply to churches and Christians now-“I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.” “Go,” says God to Jeremiah, “and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown; Israel was holiness unto the Lord, and the first fruits of his increase.”

And we do well to call to remembrance the former days-the days of first love. Oh, how little dominion had the world over us then. How did we find his word, and eat it; and it was the joy and rejoicing of our souls. Then we not only called the Sabbath of the Lord a delight, but felt it so; and we numbered the intervening days. What pleasure we found in waiting upon God; the trifling things that detain us now had no power with us then. We said, “One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.”

“What peaceful hours I then enjoyed,

How sweet their memory still,

But they have left an aching void,

The world can never fill.”